Ed M. answered • 01/12/16
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About sentence 1., there should be a comma between the adjectives beautiful and romantic since the position of these can be interchanged in this sentence. That is, we can say either a beautiful, romantic place or a romantic, beautiful place because both these adjectives appear to modify place (cf. a beautiful place and a romantic place).
On the other hand, if beautiful is meant to qualify romantic itself, then the adverb form of beautiful would be required, i.e., a beautifully romantic place.
About sentence 2., someone is grammatically and conceptually singular, so strictly speaking the plural pronoun they should not be used to refer back to someone (or somebody), though in informal usage they is very often used in this manner and hardly felt to be plural (especially if the precise referent of someone is unknown or unclear). Another problem is that if one tries to replace they by a singular pronoun in such cases, the issue of gender may arise, but at least in the case of this sentence it is presumed the speaker/writer is well aware of the gender of the person who "came to see how I was doing," so replacing they with he or she shouldn't pose any problems of awkward gender specification.
Similarly, in sentence 3. the sense is that the speaker/writer is describing a personal experience and particularly one involving physical sensations, so it seems quite incongruous to use your even if the reference of this possessive adjective is general and not a specific "you" as the reader/hearer. That is, my instead of your would seem more appropriate.
About sentence 4, I think there are problems of semantics and word choice here rather than ones of grammar and proofreading. Setting aside the question of whether the modifier of cabin should be well-lit or well-lighted, is the reference to interior or exterior lighting? The use of scenery seems to favor the interpretation that the lighting is exterior, i.e., the view of these cabins illuminated from the outside would be the "scenery" (which we probably wouldn't use to describe how cabins look from the inside even if the lighting is "good"), but the context just doesn't make the choice clear enough.
And I see two possible problems in sentence 5.:
- Many people object to using so as a qualifier of degree, i.e., to answer the question "how ___?" That is, either I am happy or I am very happy, not "so happy" though informally this use of so is common.
- Probably more a matter of stylistics and rhetoric, but I could also imagine some people decrying the "illogical" order in my parents, friends and family because the speaker/writer goes from parents, the closest natural relation, to friends which of course denotes a relationship that is not at all determined by facts of reproduction and finally to family which is a relation that usually (though not always) is dependent on reproduction, hence the "logical" sequence would be my parents, family and friends (or even my parents and family and my friends if one felt the need to make the distinction even finer).
